


Fire and Tampons

by missema



Series: If It Isn't Love [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Backstory, Dating, F/M, Fire, Kissing, Magic, New Relationship, Oral Sex, Relationship(s), Sleeping Together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-22
Updated: 2014-12-22
Packaged: 2018-03-02 18:26:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2821895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missema/pseuds/missema
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even after Phedre Trevelyan and Cullen start dating, they don't see each other as much as they'd like.  An untimely emergency brings them together for a weekend that neither wants to end.</p>
<p>Modern AU story set after Mistletoe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fire and Tampons

It was Friday night, and Phedre was exhausted. What happened to the eager weekends of her early twenties, when she'd go out on Friday nights and start the weekend off right? Now she just wanted a shower and some food, and possibly a glass of wine to complete the picture.

It was late. Her work had kept her at her office for hours after the others had gone home. Cassandra, her business partner and friend, chided her for staying so late that night.

"Aren't you going out with Cullen tonight?" She asked, but Phedre shook her head.

"We both had to work late, but he sent me a message. I just want to get this last bit done before I go home, and then I'm going to sleep for ten hours." She proclaimed.

Cassandra eyed her, but kept her admonishment short. "We could hire more help, then you might even see Cullen more than you text him."

Phedre laughed, but her tiredness made it a short laugh. "You approve then?"

She'd never asked Cassandra what she thought of her relationship with Cullen, once it came to light. But without Cassandra, Phedre would never have met Cullen. In the early days of their business, it just been the two of them working out of her apartment. Cassandra convinced her to use subcontractors where they could. Phedre'd wanted to do everything internally to save money. Cassandra had been the one to approach Leliana and get their help. With meeting Leliana came Cullen and their other partner, Josephine.

"I do. Very much. Your personalities are well-suited."

It hadn't been long since they started dating, but Cassandra wasn't surprised when she told her. The words were surprising and the kindness struck a chord within Phedre. "Thank you. I promise to get home soon, but you can leave now. You seem ready to go."

"I am. It's been a long week. But I can stay as long as you're here."

Phedre waved a hand at her, and promised to leave soon. Cassandra relented and left the office for home. Another hour passed before Phedre could leave, but she made herself go before she could get caught up in another project. Anything she thought would 'just take a minute' wound up taking up hours.

When she got to her apartment at long last, she was grateful to be home. The long days had run into each other, unbroken save for the dinner she'd shared with Cullen earlier that week. He had come round to her office, then dropped her off their after their dinner, despite his protests. That had been on Tuesday, or maybe Wednesday? It had been a while since she'd seen him.

She'd intended to take a quick shower, but the warm water eased aches she hadn't realized she harbored. Her neck and back were angry from her continued deskwork, and her feet demanded relief from hours in heels. When Phedre emerged from the steam, it was later than she thought and her stomach rumbled. She'd shared a dinner with Cassandra as they worked, but then she'd worked for another three hours after that.

All that was on her mind as she slipped into warm cashmere pajamas was to get a snack and catch up on her email. Her hair brushed back into a ponytail, Phedre headed to her kitchen.

Then the fire alarm klaxon rang through the whole apartment complex.

With her bare feet jammed into rainboots and her coat thrown over her pajamas, Phedre grabbed her bags and headed outside. When she'd come home her priority hadn't been unpacking her work, and she was thankful for it now. She didn't know where the fire was, if it was even in her building. Though there were several buildings in her complex, they all evacuated if one had an alarm. It was to prevent people from thinking they were safe if the fire spread from one building to another.

Off in the distance, she heard the answering wail of fire engines. They would be there soon, and Phedre felt a pang of guilt. Were she a better mage, she might have been able to help. It was another reason she hardly used her magic anymore. It had no place in her daily life beyond lighting candles. That itself was the problem. She could create fire, could destroy people and incinerate them so there was nothing left, but she couldn't help. There was no helping anyone with her magic.

Snow and rain slushed down atop her head, and Phedre pulled out her umbrella from her work bag. It was a miserable night she thought, as she moved with the rest of the displaced apartment dwellers to a safe distance. There were children among the crowd, looking sleepy while attached to their parents. It was too cold for all of them to be outside.

The phone rang inside of her bag and Phedre had a mild scuffle with her belongings trying to locate it. She found it just in time, accepting the call without looking to see who it was first.

"Phedre, what's going on?" Cullen sounded worried in her ear. He must be at home, probably looking out the window at the commotion.

"There's a fire, but I'm not sure where. We're all just outside. There's definitely smoke coming from somewhere." She said, voice rising as more sirens added to the din.

"Can you come here?" He asked. She could just hear him with all the noise around her.

"I can't get to my car. We've been moved away from the building. I could walk." She began, but Cullen cut her off.

"No." The word was stern. "Emergency vehicles don't have to stop for pedestrians when their lights and sirens are on. Let me come get you. Is there a safe place for me to pick you up?"

Phedre looked around, past the crush of bodies and anxious faces to see if there were any clear areas. She spotted one. "Yes, the leasing office. It's got it's own entrance, so the trucks won't have to go there. I'll wait outside of it."

"I'm on my way." he said, and hung up.

Miuntes later, Cullen pulled up and Phedre got in his car from the cold. There was a mess of boxes in the back of Cullen's car, but she fit in. He pulled her into a rough, one-armed hug as she did. She hugged him back as best she could, mindful not to get him wet. He didn't seem to care.

He was never good with words. In the weeks they'd been dating, he had trouble saying what he meant and she suspected that he held in a great deal around her. Words never seemed to match up with his heart, but they muddled through. When they had their meaningful talks, he paused a lot, thinking through what he said before he let it out. Phedre appreciated all of these things, and knew what that hug meant. It was him, unable to find words to say how worried he'd been when he called. She was safe with him.

Getting back to his house was quick and uneventful. The fire engines had gotten to the apartment complex, but she saw no flames as they drove away. She hoped there weren't casualties, but even in the crowd she heard nothing of injuries of people trapped, just a lot of confusion. No one seemed to know where the fire was.

She'd been to Cullen's house before, but never further in than his living room. It was modest, messy and smelled like cedar. They spent their time together out, or kissing in the doorways, their respective work schedules making it hard to do more. But there she was, standing in her pajamas, barefoot in Cullen's kitchen as he offered her food. It felt comfortable, and well overdue.

He was also dressed for bed, his coat and shoes thrown hastily over a t-shirt that had seen better days and a pair of fleece pants. The shirt was old and worn, but looked extremely cozy and was emblazoned with the emblem of the templar order and what she thought might have been the year he finished training. It was from over ten years before, and had been washed many times. She thought she could see the outline of a tattoo on his bicep, but the shirt obscured just enough that she wasn't sure. The pants were slung low on his hips, falling to that resting position as if it were where he wore all of his trousers. The shirt stretched tight across his shoulders in a way it surely hadn't when he got it, and Phedre admired the sight of him in something other than a suit.

Unaware of her scrutiny, Cullen turned back to her. "I've got a frozen pizza, if that's more interesting than cereal." He offered. The man had five different types of breakfast cereal - he seemed to live off of it.

"What's on it?"

He opened the freezer to check. "Just cheese."

"That's perfect." Phedre said. "Do you have any wine?'

"I think so." He said, back to scouring his cabinets for the lone bottle of wine he'd been given as a gift recently. She excused herself to use the half-bathroom on the first floor.

It was newly redone, like most of his townhouse. The day he'd drove her home after lunch, he'd mentioned his brother helping him replace his kitchen cabinets. They'd obviously done more work than that on the whole of his place. The notable exception was the kitchen, which aside from still needing new cabinets, had an outdated style that didn't match the rest of the modern mix of metal and dark wood decor. It would look sophisticated when it was all done, but each room that she saw had something missing. Most of his walls lacked any sort of decor, and there were no rugs on the hardwood floors. The bathroom she used had no plates on the light switches or outlets.

When Phedre exited the bath, she went straight for her own bags. She needed a tampon, completely unexpectedly on top of everything else that had happened that night. Just the realization had made her roll her eyes in frustration, but it was the way of things. Rummaging around in her bag produced nothing, her little wallet of supplies surprisingly empty.

A glance out the window showed that there was still a commotion at her apartment, but the crowd of people had largely dispersed. But going to her own apartment felt unappealing at the moment, and she would rather replenish her supplies. She went back into the kitchen, slightly disgusted with her own disorganization and took a deep breath. This wasn't how she'd planned on spending her night.

"Cullen, I need to run to the store." She said as he placed a glass of wine in front of her.

"Is something wrong?"

"I need a tampon." The way she said it, the words came out strained and more like a question. It wasn't that she was embarrassed by her body, but rather that she had to interrupt their unexpected time together to do so. Plus, it wasn't like her to be unprepared.

But Cullen didn't seem taken aback by her pronouncement. He tilted his head to the side and instead of handing her the keys to his car like she'd hoped, he motioned for her to follow him. They went upstairs to his master bath, and he dug around under his sink, then produced an open box of tampons. Phedre took it with an eyebrow raised in surprise.

"They're not from anyone else, if that's what you're thinking." He said. "I used to get nosebleeds all the time as a child, my mother always used them. When I stopped taking lyrium, my nosebleeds were quite frequent, for a time."

"You stopped taking lyrium?" She wished she could have withheld the incredulous note from her voice, but she failed. She knew he wasn't part of the Order any longer, though he'd never told her more than he quit after being in Kirkwall, moved back to Ferelden and bought his house to be close to his family. He was 'reestablishing ties' in his words. Phedre thought looking for peace was a closer description, but kept that to herself.

"Yes. I know many never do when they leave but I didn't want ties to that life." Cullen said, straightening up.

"I can't imagine that's been easy."

Cullen gave a hard laugh. "No, it hasn't been. Come with me." He said, leading her into the next room.

It was his bedroom, a gorgeous, large room in deep brown woods and shades of grey and metal accents. The room itself was a mess, Cullen's bed unmade with his laptop and a book on top amidst a sea of tangled sheets. The nightstand had a large clock on it and a lamp, the drawer only partially closed. The room was full of gadgetry, thought Phedre was only able to identify a few things - humidifier, fan, noise machine. His suits, so neat when he wore them, were draped over the back of a chair carelessly. He must spend a fortune on dry cleaning.

He motioned around with one hand. "I don't sleep well, if you couldn't guess. Some of that is because of the lyrium withdrawal. That is part of the reason I've never invited you to stay with me, even though I've wanted you here. I am not peaceful when I rest, and you deserve more."

"Cullen, what I want is you, all of you. I'd happily spend a whole night just talking and holding you. I don't care that you can't sleep, but you obviously do. Until you're ready, I can wait. I assume you have a guest room if we aren't going to sleep in the same bed?"

Phedre was going to suggest that he give her a tour of his house, something to lighten the tension between them and relieve his obvious discomfort. Cullen held everything so tight to himself, she knew he would feel vulnerable after such an admission. She felt like she'd seen too much, and worried he might close off. But Cullen took her hand and pulled her into an embrace. She hugged him back, the box of tampons still clutched in her hand.

"Stay with me tonight. I can bring the food and wine up here while you, um, take care of things."

"Alright."

Once they were settled, their night got on quite nicely. She was glad to be with him, even if it was unexpected. Phedre curled up in Cullen's bed, the two of them eating as they watched the last part of an old action movie together. Both of them were tired, the adrenaline from the eventful night wearing off. It was easy for her to fall asleep there, and once the food and wine were both gone, she did. Whether or not Cullen went to sleep as easily, she didn't know.

It was the middle of the night when she had to get up to pee again. Cullen was entwined with her, his legs woven between hers. Extricating herself wasn't easy, but Phedre moved carefully so she didn't disturb him more than was needful. He moved, but she didn't think he woke. Still mostly asleep, she made her way to and from the bathroom without incident, and got back in the bed with Cullen. He pulled her close.

"Sorry to wake you." She whispered, but Cullen covered her apology with a kiss. It was the type of kiss that wouldn't have occurred if the two of them were fully awake, slow, hot and devoid of expectation or interest in doing anything but kissing.

It went on like that for a while, she was of no mind to wonder about the exact amount of time. They kissed in their sleepy, cozy way until one of them shifted. There was no way to be sure which one of them moved, but the slight movement was like tipping a bottle. In the scant light, Cullen's eyes opened and his grip tightened. Phedre's next kiss was harder, more intense and demanding. Hands roamed over soft fabric, seeking out skin and and warmth. His tongue no longer slid lazily into her mouth but moved with intent, teasing and determined.

His lips traveled, moving down to kiss chin and jaw, to suck at hollow of her throat and neck. She drew a finger across the lines of his stomach, invisible in the darkness of the room. He sucked in a hard breath as the edge of her blunted fingernail slowed moved across his skin. She'd never seen Cullen without his shirt, but her hands were telling her more than her eyes could in the darkness. There wasn't a part that she could feel that wasn't exquisite, nowhere she didn't want to touch until she knew every inch intimately.

At his waistband she hesitated. When her fingers stayed there for too long, he kissed under her ear, then whispered in it. "Yes." The word was a whisper swallowed by a growl, the feeling of it breathed against her overheated skin making her shiver.

Then her hand delved past the fabric and took him in hand. She was careful, with light touches just to start. Cullen kissed her again, his attention brought back to her mouth. When he put his hand around hers and gently guided it into a long, sweeping stroke, his tongue mimicked the movement in her mouth. Phedre's hand wrapped tighter around his cock, alternating squeezes with strokes.

They only broke apart when his breathing grew ragged, and by then she was emboldened enough to take him into her mouth. Her hands rolled his pants past his waist until his hardness was completely revealed to her. She took him in slowly, first kissing the tip with soft lips, then a swipe of tongue here and there until she took all of him in hands and mouth at the same time. He moaned as she set a pace and kept to it, feeling him harden more in her mouth as a reward.

It wouldn't take long, she knew. He'd been close before, when it had just been her hands and the added heat and friction of her mouth would overwhelm him. The sheets around her were gathered taut, pulled into bunches in Cullen's fists as he lay beneath her. His hips rolled towards her, no longer keeping a steady pace but as frantic as his stuttered breathing. When he could form words, it was only ' _Phedre_ ' or ' _yes_ ' or ' _please_ ' that made it out.

His climax coiled within him until it couldn't be contained any longer. She felt it just before it broke over him, in the sharp jut of his hips against her, the curl of his toes, and in the incoherency of his cries. Then it was nothing but the heat of him in her mouth, filling her as he cried out loud. She swallowed, tasting all salt and bitter and intensity until his moans became weaker, his hips bucking less as she hummed around him. When it was over, he hauled her back up to him, bringing her back for a kiss.

Cullen was no less voracious in his kiss afterwards than before, and she let him taste himself on her tongue. He hugged her to his chest, breath still not quite regulated as they settled back in together. After a few more minutes, she felt Cullen lift his hips and pull his pants back up. He also brought the blanket back over them, carefully covering them both. He stroked her hair, and she maneuvered herself into a sleeping position, not more fooling around. She nuzzled his chest, his neck, as tiredness reasserted its grip. It was still hours until morning, the city dark outside of the window. They couldn't have slept more than a couple of hours before she'd woken them both up. Cullen's breathing was slow and even, his arm looped loosely around her. Phedre moved her head to his chest, and let her eyes close.

The next morning, Phedre woke up alone in Cullen's bed. The sound of the shower came from nearby and she could smell coffee brewing. Her body protested as she sat up. It was still early, though not very. The sky was partially pink and hazy, but it was winter and the sunrises were late. She peeked out of the window to look at her apartment building and finally saw marks of the fire on the building next to hers. Lingering smoke smoldered dark against the sky, and she could see soot marks on the building. When she closed her eyes and concentrated, she could feel the traces of magic around it. So it had been caused magically. Only magic could extinguish a magical fire, and she was glad she'd left. Her magic wouldn't have been any help, and she would have just felt useless as she stood in the crowd.

"You're awake." Cullen said as he entered the room. He was dressed and shaved, his hands smoothing back his hair.

"Yes. I was looking at the building."

"I read there no one was killed, but some people were treated for smoke inhalation." Cullen said.

"It's in the news?" She asked.

"Yes. It's always a matter of public record when a mage comes into their power." He said the words without inflection, but she knew what he wasn't saying.

Phedre turned away from him to look out the window. "That's how I came into my power. I can cast fire, but not ice. That's why I couldn't help." She didn't turn back to him, but smiled out the window. "I burned down the barn. Nearly died. My sister was so mad at me, but there was nothing in there, just extra supplies. We have a proper stable for our horses, but my sister came down there and started screaming at me. It scared me so much I started crying and making even more fire. I couldn't control it. My eldest brother picked me up and made her stop. He told me that magic would make me special and that I could go to a special school and meet more people like me." She laughed. "He was right, in a way."

When she faced him, Cullen was giving her an unreadable look. It was almost as if he were burying the things he wanted to say, putting them all behind a mask carefully cultivated to show nothing at all. "What's wrong?" she asked.

"Did you serve?"

"With fire at my command? Yes, of course." Most mages that could be combat trained served in the army. "But I wasn't suited to that life. I left after the mandatory period."

"What was your rank?"

"Enchanter Lieutenant. I was on the path to become a Knight-Enchanter, but..." Phedre trailed off, shaking her head. "I couldn't."

Cullen gave a soft chuckle. "It seems neither of us were made for that life. It's just that I forget you have magic sometimes."

"Does it bother you?"

"Show me." He said. She nodded then held out her hand, easily conjuring a ball of energy that fit in her palm. Cullen beckoned her towards him and she came, still holding onto the energy. It sparked brighter when she was closer to him. The colors changed slightly, though she hadn't altered the spell.

"I've never understood why magic does that." He murmured.

Phedre titled her head to the side and considered him. "Don't you? It's my energy, and I like you. It's emotional, and that's why people think it's unstable, and fear it. But it only changed because you're you, and how I feel for you influenced it." He put his hand over hers, covering her spell. She let it fade.

"Battle magic isn't like that. Fire is fire, like other elemental spells. True, it can be stronger when you're scared or weak when tired, but for the most part it isn't personal. When you see just my energy, it's nothing but part of me. It acts like part of me."

Cullen leaned in and kissed her, surprising her as she spoke. It felt like the kisses from that night, when he'd been hot and wanting in her arms. She wondered if her magic excited or frightened him, and which was more present. But she didn't get to ask because when they broke apart, Cullen was cupping her face in his large hands.

"I have some stuff to drop off for work, but I wanted to know if you'd stay with me." He smiled at her. "Waking up with you in my arms isn't something I just want for one night." His thumb trailed under her chin and tilted up towards him.

"I can go home while you're busy and come back after I change and have a shower." She said, agreeing as she planned in her mind. The work in her bag called, but there would always be work. She and Cullen, they'd never had a weekend together, hardly spent more than a few hours with each other in a stretch. The thought of another day and night with him felt decadent.

"Stay until Monday morning. I can take you to work." He was asking, even if he didn't make it a question. Phedre nodded.

"Alright." She smiled up at him. "Is there any breakfast?" She asked.

Cullen laughed softly as he took her hand, promising to make her whatever she wanted.


End file.
